And the burning platform is still, uhm, burning. "Chief Executive Stephen Elop is placing hopes of a turnaround on a new range of smartphones called Lumia, which use largely untried Microsoft software. But Lumia sales have so far been slow, disappointing investors." It's a shame to see a once proud company in such a downward spiral, but alas, it's the way of business. If you get complacent - as Nokia had gotten - you will fail.

They didn't loose the opportunity. They killed it on purpose (for no reason, besides pleasing MS).

They're too crucial to Windows Phone for Microsoft to ever let that happen.

But Windows Phone is not crucial for Nokia, despite all the PR which placates it otherwise. I.e. while MS benefits from pushing WP on Nokia, Nokia only suffers from that partnership. IMO in the long run, it will either damage Nokia beyond repair, or will cause them to dump the MS deal if they'll get sober in time.

But Windows Phone is not crucial for Nokia, despite all the PR which placates it otherwise. I.e. while MS benefits from pushing WP on Nokia, Nokia only suffers from that partnership.

This is absolute bullshit. Make Nokia an Android OEM and they die tomorrow. They definitely don't have the cash on hand to do something like that.

Their stock would plunge through the floor, there'd be open revolt if they pivoted yet again to Android. A market already saturated by OEMs. Anyone who's not Samsung or HTC really doesn't do well on Android.

Ask Sony, Acer, Asus, LG, etc.

You think Nokia would fare better? Its an entrenched market.

On Windows Phone, Nokia has eaten their lunches because they took advantage of the fact that OEMs put in half efforts into the platform.

If Samsung, HTC, LG, and the other Windows Phone OEMs put in as much effort as Nokia, and each sold as much as Nokia does with the Lumia, Windows Phone marketshare would look much closer to 10% than it does now.

Too much has been sunk into marketing for the Lumia series, and Lumia again, for the third time, is not their problem.

Microsoft would (hypothetically) save them not because Lumia is doing bad, but because Symbian is, and if Symbian goes, so does Nokia and the whole ship.

IMO in the long run, it will either damage Nokia beyond repair, or will cause them to dump the MS deal if they'll get sober in time.

There is really no long run, unless they do major restructuring. They have months, not years before they burn through their reserves. Let's be realistic.

They need to:
- Restructure, downsize, become a leaner company
- Double down on Windows Phone investments
- Push Windows Phone into the low end Smartphone range (Totally, completely achievable. Its not an IF, its a WHEN proposition).

I expect one of two things:
A loan from MSFT or an outright buyout from MSFT. Loan being more likely.

This will give them the time they need to complete their transition, without the Symbian deadweight cannibalizing their finances.

This is not about the MS deal. The failures of Symbian, Maemo, and Meego happened much before.

Symbian have been dead in smartphone market for several years now. I had their T-Mobile pushed device (Nokia Nuron) temporarily, and it was an almost total disaster. It worked, but the interface was even worse than Windows Mobile 6. (Not even mentioning iOS, or Android).

They mismanaged, and abandoned Maemo very badly. I was an unfortunate owner of a Nokia N800. Initially, I was really excited to have a portable Linux device that could do Sykpe on the go. However they abandoned the device with the release of N810 (and that with N900). They did not even fully support the on board camera, or the opengl chip.

And, MeeGo (which would have fixed my issues) was stillborn. There was no real release, except for N900. And then I sold my N800 - seeing there is no future.

I was with them when they failed. They knew little about Linux based device support less than even the Sharp Zaurus. That is how I know they had no options, but to depend on an external OS supplier (Symbian was doing good before Nokia purchase as well).

I think they should've redoubled on their Symbian support (instead of ringing its Death Knell years before they can replace it). If Symbian sales would've held strong, Nokia would actually be doing great right now. That was a severe miscalculation on their part.

I'm on the fence about the MeeGo stuff, on one hand, the project was really going nowhere (Evidenced by N9 not even using the publicly available MeeGo stuff, but Nokia's own incarnation), on the other hand it did create a lot of ill will. This I think was a harder decision.

They've done well for Windows Phone. I hope with WP8 (being announced in six days) that they'll launch some low cost phones to replace Symbian.

Of course it couldn't go anywhere, because Nokia sabotaged it right when it was in critical development stage, and Intel decided to dump it shortly afterwards. So the project itself can't be really blamed. But brainless mismanagement of it coming from Nokia - can.